The Wake #7Review

Confession time: I read a lot of comics. This may or may not come as a shock, considering I review them for a living. But it's an important detail that informs my perspective as a reviewer. I am overly familiar with the formulas and tropes that often find their way into comics, so when I say that The Wake, by Scott Snyder and Sean Murphy, is doing something new and exciting, I don't mean it lightly.

Frequently, when writers or artists strive for something iconic, they create a distance in the work between the story and audience. In The Wake #7, we see that it's not impossible to build something as epic as a creation myth without sacrificing the magic of the mundane. Leeward's struggle is almost quotidian when compared to the monsters that populate her world, but it's that Everyman quality to her thoughts and actions that makes her undeniably human in a world where her species is on the verge of destruction, both from internal and external threats.

The atmosphere created by the book's visuals lends itself to that sense of the iconic while balancing it with the grittier reality of Leeward's situation. The ship-sized Mer that attacks the vessel she's on is almost godlike compared to her and the full page splash that depicts its fury is a masterclass on using color, shadow, and shape to evoke a sensation of awe. Murphy's art and Snyder's writing are so intimately intwined with each other that it's impossible to imagine The Wake without either one at the helm.

Melissa Grey wears Green Lantern pajamas to bed and writes stories for a living. She can be found on MyIGN at MelissaGrey or lurking on Twitter @meligrey.

Amazing

Snyder and Murphy expertly balance the mundane and the iconic in The Wake #7.